31 October 2010

THE WRONG THINGS: Ghostbusters (Ivan Reitman, 1984)

Often, while watching movies or teevee, instead of paying attention to important things like the storyline or character development or editing patterns or soundtrack choices, or even looking at distracting little background details, I find myself fixating on the wrong things, namely, the costuming. This doesn't happen a lot during contemporary productions -- especially network dramedies, not that I've watched many of those* -- which regularly seem to assume the role of "fashion" show more than anything, but instead during non-period, older films, set during the time during which they were made. Like Ghostbusters.


The modifier in "sexy librarian" is just redundant.

Man, I love how people dressed in the late seventies and early eighties.

But sadly, at this time, I don't have the money or means** with which to acquire such outfits. So I'll just post screencaps of them instead.







There weren't many opportunities for good frame grabs, but Bill Murray, when not suited up, was really rocking that plaid shirt/woolly vest look. Worked for Janine, too, but the hipsters have already claimed her giant glasses, so I'm not even going to try for a Melnitz and instead, in that future dreamland in which my disposable income reaches the double digits, put my energy into pursuing my own Dr. Vestman look. You see what I did there?


*I was in seventh grade! You're allowed to like The OC and Gilmore Girls when you're thirteen! And I only bought the DVD boxsets because of nostalgia, not because I secretly still have a crush on young Adam Brody or anything. That would be ridiculous.
**Ebay/time machine (go back to 1979, and buy that vintage shit when it was new! -- and don't worry, I've already started collecting old school dollar bills)

28 October 2010

THE LITTLE THINGS: Bored to Death, S02E02



I like it that on Bored to Death, little written things appear to be the products of actual time and talent (please see: the opening credits), unlike the stock "newspaper stories," et cetera that you'll see on a lot of shows (the headline will be plot-relevant, but the bit of article shown will be some bland, generic sentences about a bank robbery or something -- the next time I come across one of these I'll screencap it instead of just sighing with disappointment).

Also apparently this story was written by my grandpa. Great job, Gramps, but remember to work on your word choice.

27 October 2010

THE LITTLE THINGS: Friends, S07E19



YES, HORNBERGER!

I watched this episode entirely only for the young Scott Adsit appearance. I wanted to see how bald he was. And I want to marry him. Please don't judge me.

REVIEW: United 93 -- like the LOST pilot, if it were composed entirely of unbearably tedious Jack and Kate scenes

I wrote this for a class, but then decided, hey! I wrote it! It's kind of short! It's kind of more an analysis than a review, but might as well post it here, too!

I've also added pictures.


Samuel Weber, in his article War, Terrorism, and Spectacle, writes that after the fall of the Twin Towers, US citizens had to be urged to "start spending again," to "get back to consuming," and in many ways this economic reinvigoration has emerged as a consumption of the tragedy itself. United 93 (Paul Greengrass, 2006) is one such consumer product. The film tells the story of United Flight 93, the fourth plane hijacked on September 11th, 2001, and the only one in which passengers were able to overpower the terrorists, and crash the plane far from the intended target.


Feel free to judge the entire film based on this one image.

United 93 is imbued with "authenticity"; it is "a terse realistic depiction of ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances" (Žižek). In Slavoj Žižek's response to the film, he describes it as trying to be "as anti-Hollywood as possible": there are "no special effects, no grandiloquent heroic gestures" and "no glamorous stars" (except the post-2006 breakouts Olivia Thirlby (Juno, The Wackness, Bored to Death) and Cheyenne "Shy Action" Jackson (30 Rock)). The cinematography consists mainly of shaky hand-held camera-work. The set designers explicitly strived to capture the "feel" of 2001, with characters' hand-held technology as the prime indicator—doomed passengers tell their families they love them on old clamshell mobiles and airphones; a girl listens to a CD player; a woman comments on a fellow passenger's boxy laptop—"Is that the latest model?" Locations are captioned ("Northeast Air Defense Command Center, Rome, New York") as though they really are the places for which they are standing in. When the hijackings do finally occur, observers meet them less with panic than disbelief. Those reporting the hijacks have to repeatedly quell incredulity and questions of "Is this a sim?" with affirmations that no, "This is real world." These skeptical characters ask questions the audience would, so as characters are reassured, so, too, are viewers, of United 93's realism.


Shy Anne ain't shy on talent.

Žižek writes that this "avoiding of sensationalism," and "sober and restrained style"—this "touch of authenticity" should make viewers suspicious, as to "what ideological purposes it serves." But even more so, this meticulous authenticity and choice to present the movie as in "real-time"(a minute of screen-time is a minute of the viewer's time; no fades or ellipses) just makes the film boring. Whereas in a movie concerning fictional events, long stretches of mundanity could provide tension for what is to come, in United 93, even the least news-houndish of viewers already know what is going to happen. Greengrass's little attempts at foreshadowing—choosing to show an interminably long emergency exit demonstration instead of utilizing the only truncating editing device available (cutting to the just-as-dull military and airline control rooms)—and his efforts at creating tension, with furtive looks exchanged between the soon-to-be-terrorists, are rendered futile. These hijackers are presented not as a part of some incomprehensibly large and shady terrorist organization, but as "desperate and deranged individuals" (Weber), the violence they commit becoming a private matter. Thus as the terrorists are the only well-defined and therefore identifiable characters, the viewer comes to root for them, if just so that something will happen. This seems the reverse of the intended effect of any so patriotic a film, but could possibly be deliberate, so as to make the viewer feel ashamed of such thoughts, and therefore guilt-trip them into higher degrees of nationalism. But Greengrass, director of two of the Bourne films, does not merit the assumption of such subtle emotional prowess.


We may hate A-rabs, but we ain't no fuckin' racists.

Instead, as Weber writes, this seemingly-authentic spectacle allows the viewers to "identify with the ostensibly invulnerable perspective of the camera." The unavoidable, unanswerable question of who is filming these presented-as-real events only augments the camera's invincible position. Unlike television news media, in which subjects are very aware of the camera's existence within their space, United 93 is presented as though there is no one there filming it, and the viewer is voyeuristically watching these events occur right as they happen. The spectacle, and thus the spectator, is "at once here and elsewhere" (Weber). Elsewhere on United 93 as it is hijacked, but simultaneously here, in a theatre seat, safe to go home once the credits role, without the fatal ends of the actual passengers (there were no survivors, as told by a title card). The spectator thus feels triumphant, immortal. They have gone back in time and taken part in destroying these terrorists, and due to the obsessive degree of realism, they feel as though they know how this really happened (though in reality, there are no survivors to corroborate Greengrass's version of the events), and thus feel that they could easily deal with a hijacking themselves. This terrorism does not seem so unexpected anymore. All someone needs to quash it is enough confident, middle-class white male patriots to figure out a plan; just some hot water, knives, and forks—the available supplies on an everyday commercial flight.


Even extreme realism can't stand in for the truth. Thanks, credits!

Žižek asserts that with United 93, this disaster "turned into a kind of triumph" sustains the United State's need for "major catastrophe in order to resuscitate the spirit of communal solidarity." But even more so, this film (perhaps groundlessly) reestablishes that superior feeling destroyed when the Twin Towers were; that American idea that "it can't happen here." United 93 provides the United States with a post-9/11 update of that wholesome, very American mantra: "It can happen here, but we now know how to deal with it." A sign shown in the opening scenes of the film reads, "God bless America." And God bless America indeed, for with the false sense of security perpetuated by such cultural products as United 93, if ever a very real, non-privatized terror strikes, we are going to need all the benedictions we can get.



Notes:
-I realize the whole "privatized" terrorism argument is not very well developed, but if you'd read the articles we had to read, it kind of would be.
-Before accusing me of being heartless, I actually did tear up during the bit when people were calling their families. Though I did laugh when Shy Anne was all, "You believe me, don't you, Mom?"
-I've never seen the Bourne films but I'm assuming they're not "imbued" with much emotional depth. Matt Damon's been funny in 30 Rock, though, so I guess that's good, right?
-I also stopped watching LOST mid-way through season two, when they killed everybody I liked, so maybe new, even less bearable characters are introduced and I should give Kack some slack. But since I couldn't even get through the first couple of seasons even with the promise of Jeremy Davies come season five, I'm not sure even J.J. Abrams could come up with something so torturous.
-Then again, I've watched both Alias and Felicity… young Jeffrey Jacob really does have a talent for making his viewers want to stab out their corneas.
-Dude, but in LOST that one guy had a gun! So they could have just shot the terr'rists. But also they were flying from Australia, and even the smallest, least-notorious terrorist organizations are not that desperate.
-Also, the terr'rists were the only vaguely attractive actors in U93, so maybe I was a bit biased in my response.

Articles:
Slavoj Žižek, Five Years After: the Fire in the Minds of Men
Samuel Weber, War, terrorism, and spectacle: On Towers and Caves

24 October 2010

terrible jokes

My submission to The Coll-egg-tible Eggers Family*:



*I couldn't find an actual website for it, so I'm posting a link to this person's blog post cos I thought it was funny. Does the lack of egg-ternet pr-egg-ence s-egg-gest that the world has been ridden of the Eggers for egg-ver? This both fills me with egg-zuberance and makes me a bit l-egg-chrymose, that future g-egg-nerations will have egg-ceedingly less ovum pun-filled egg-sistences. I do r-egg-ret that last sentence.

Also, why is this on the first page of google image results when searching for "egg"??

18 October 2010

THINGS I'VE DONE: I Done Stood Up

I decided, eh, might as well just post this every place possible on the internet.



Comedy done uncomfortably, at the Works in Progress Festival 2010.

Props to not-my-sister Chelsea for the fine video-work.

http://wipfestival.tumblr.com/

16 October 2010

THE LITTLE THINGS: Gentlemen Broncos (Jared Hess, 2009)

This movie is okay. It derails into silliness and predictable jokes sometimes, but other times is infused with a brilliant, very enjoyable absurdity. It's about a kid whose sci-fi story is stolen by a well-known sci-fi novelist. Frustrating, though, is the fact the Hesses -- who with Napoleon Dynamite show they clearly understand how little others are interested in the concerns of society's rejects -- did not exploit the joke or acknowledge the reality that no one outside of a very small community would care about whether a science fiction writer has plagiarized. So much opportunity for hilarity, wasted!

Yeah, but recently in conversation I referenced this detail in the end credits, so I've decided it probably needs to exist somewhere on the interwebs:



Very reassuring, AHA.

like a webcomic, but filled with regrets

12 October 2010

Dear Creepy Middle-to-Old-Aged Man Who Lives in the Apartment Next Door to Me,

I know the mailboxes for our complex are on the wall right outside of my window. I know this because I sometimes like to check my mail, too! Then I take it inside of my apartment and read it.

I also know that you're old, and you need your rest, and that it must be hard for you to deal with the physical pain of moving from place-to-place (goddman joints! tell me about it!). Thus, I'm sure that the lawn chair that for some reason is sitting between my front door and our mailboxes must seem pretty appealing.

But seriously, the front door to your apartment is, like, five feet away. And I didn't buy that chair or put it there, but I'm pretty sure the patch of grass it's on is technically part of my rental agreement. And I might want to go outside and do something on that patch of grass, or perhaps something inside my apartment that makes some noise, but my window's open and you're sitting right next to it sorting through your junk mail! Seriously -- five fucking feet! Please, just hobble that marathon distance for me. Then you can lie down and have a nap.


Sincerely,

Erin

11 October 2010

like a webcomic, if webcomics were boning up on their psychoanalytic theory

So something kind of strange happened to me today.

First off, lemme just say that I am not the kind of person who gets "hit on."

I mean, I've had my creepy-old-man-gaze encounters, sure, but I'm probably the only living example proving that you can have been in a romantic relationship without having ever been lured with a pick-up. And I mean, I get it. I don't tend to generate "come over and lay on the charm" vibes. I'm off-putting. I probably scowl. The closest I've come to being hit on is when I actually had a boyfriend and he went to the bathroom during a show and some guy started talking to me. Maybe I should get a boyfriend more often and then more guys at shows will talk to me. But I digress.

I had a midterm today, so I'd rushed out of my apartment and just thrown on a comfy grandma-style Christmas sweater cos, y'know, if you've got a midterm then what the hell, and also I like this sweater (note: my friend and ex-boif gave it to me; does that mean I can't wear it anymore?). I'd put my hair into a sloppy pony-tail and it was doing that wonderful thing it does where it's incredibly messy and sticks up all around the part with these weird short little hairs that never seem to grow out. Also, I had some stress-acne that I'd only vaguely attempted to cover-up. And one of my eyes was all itchy and red. So, y'know, epitome of gorgeousness.



(Ran out of room for shoes.)

Except apparently, yes.

So I got on the bus, got off "downtown," had seven minutes until class but it only took three to walk from there, and as getting to class early would just entail talking to classmates and not studying, I decided to sit at the bus stop for a minute and finish attempting to cram into my brain Freud's theories about desire and mom boobs and et cetera.

There are these people who hang around the bus stops by the "mall" in Iowa City. They're not the homeless people who frequent the "ped mall," but they're just as scary, possibly more so cos I don't think any of them are homeless and yet they all still have the audacity to ask you for bus fare. And, I don't want to sound racist -- though as I scowl-faced type this, I should probably just accept that I am who I am -- but they're (mostly?) all black. I only mention this because I am the whitest fucking kid I know, and though I've found myself romantically drawn to my own share of brown-skinned men, the creepy-gaze demographics have indicated there's never been a case of this being reciprocal.

So I was hunched over on a bus-stop bench, rapidly scanning notes about death and sex drives, my itchy red eye twitching furiously, my anxiety levels only deepening my off-putting frown.



"Axescuse me, can I have some change for the bus?"

I barely looked up.

"I'm sorry, I don't have any money..."

I think maybe I attempted a smile, because my sister told me that you should smile at homeless people because it shows empathy. I assume that this also implies that they will be less likely to stab you and sell your organs to an unfortunate dog lover.

I went back to my skimming.

Lacan... no desire can be understood/fulfilled... desire always desire for another's desire; to be desired...

"I can help you with you homework."

Obstacles... can't have obstacles without desire...

I looked up again. The guy had walked a few feet away but was still standing there, staring at me in his yellow t-shirt.

I tried my hardest at curling up those mouth-edges.

"Oh, uh, ha ha, I have a midterm and I'm just studying..."

"What's yo name?"

"Uh, Erin."

(Sometimes, I'm confused as to my seeming inability to gauge when it would be advantageous to lie.)

He said his name, I was busy thinking about Deleuze and didn't commit it to memory, we shook hands.

Can't have desire without obstacles... obstacle must come before desire; don't know desire without obstacle...

"Can I see you again?"

What?

My scowl widened to a gape.

"Do you want my number, so I can see you again?"

I hurriedly shuffled together my notes, stumbled up off the bench.

"Uh... I have to..."

"That's okay, just if you want my number..."

"Uh... midterm..."

And, dazed and confused, I fast-walked the hell off to class.

I nowhere near aced my mid-term (you don't tell your class the test's gonna be multiple choice and then make it short answer, come on!), but my cursory cramming did teach me one thing: there's a guy in a yellow t-shirt by the mall in Iowa City who apparently keeps his desires in the form of grandma sweaters, acne, and scowls. Unfortunately for him, that little bundle of goodness happens to come with the obstacle of my personality.

06 October 2010

MIDTERMS & ESSAYS

and the obligatory .gif of me getting punched in the face: